ESPN The Magazine: Your source for fashion coverage?

ATHLETES CAN DRESS UP: The 10th anniversary issue of ESPN The Magazine hit newsstands with a cover line that reads, â€œWow We’re 10! Now What?â€ Fashion, it seems, is one of the answers. The magazine plans to increase fashion coverage, has hired its first style director and will begin running fashion credits. Right away, one of the new covers (there are 10 in the anniversary issue) points to the changes: Venus Williams is wearing a white Emanuel Ungaro gown and sister Serena appears in a white gown by Donna Karan. â€œPeople want to know what athletes are wearing to and from the ballpark,â€ said Steven Binder, vice president of magazine sales. â€œESPN should be doing this.â€ It’s also a great opportunity to tap into those fashion ad dollars, although the current economic climate might make that more difficult. Binder said the magazine is also seriously considering putting on an event in Milan during the spring shows. ESPN’s average reader is male, just over 30 years old, with an income of less than $70,000, so labels such as Hugo Boss and Z Zegna will make more sense than a designer collection, Binder added. ESPN The Magazine’s circulation last year was two million.

The problem with fashion coverage in any mag is that it's dictated, or seems to be dictated, by advertising, and thus the coverage is not really for us, it's for the advertisers. To me it's more than coincidental that all of a sudden J.Press starts showing up in Esquire layouts soon after they started advertising. J.Press has not changed its styles in 50 fucking years and all of a sudden it's worthy of inclusion in fashion layouts? Now I love J.Press and I love Esquiire, but I find the pairing and the timing a bit suspicious. This is all about the money and we shouldn't believe any horseshit about ESPN mag serving readers with this.

The problem with fashion coverage in any mag is that it's dictated, or seems to be dictated, by advertising, and thus the coverage is not really for us, it's for the advertisers. To me it's more than coincidental that all of a sudden J.Press starts showing up in Esquire layouts soon after they started advertising. J.Press has not changed its styles in 50 fucking years and all of a sudden it's worthy of inclusion in fashion layouts? Now I love J.Press and I love Esquiire, but I find the pairing and the timing a bit suspicious. This is all about the money and we shouldn't believe any horseshit about ESPN mag serving readers with this.

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Winner, winner.

This is why women's magazines have two distinct features, the "fashion spreads" (those 3-5 pages of emaciated models wearing something nobody would be caught dead in public with) and the "fashion service pieces" (The best jeans for your size!). The only reason the fashion spreads still exist is to pander to the advertisers.

That said, I think this is a great move from a business perspective. They can attract not only fashion advertising, but they can use all the athletes branching out into the fashion world as a natural go-between.

"People want to know what athletes are wearing to and from the ballpark,'' said Steven Binder, vice president of magazine sales. ''ESPN should be doing this."

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Binder at first suggested the magazine target tobacco ads, before he realized Popular Mechanics cornered that market years ago. "C'mon, people want to know what atheletes are dipping to and from the ballpark."